Mike Whaley: The Troy Pappas way was the right way

Troy Pappas needed no reminder to go 100 percent — in sports, in school or in life. Because, frankly, anything less was unacceptable.

A former three-sport standout and top-10 student at Marshwood High School in South Berwick, Maine, Pappas enrolled at Bates College this fall and was a member of the football team, majoring in pre-med and biochemistry. He planned to attend medical school to pursue a career in orthopedic surgery.

But on Sept. 29, Pappas was critically injured when he fell three flights down a dormitory stairwell, suffering critical injuries that eventually claimed his life last Friday. A resident of Eliot, he was 18.

His injury and subsequent death sent a shock wave through the communities of Eliot and South Berwick. Last week was a tough one for students at Marshwood, where the popular Pappas was captain of the football and baseball teams, and also played on the basketball team. He was involved in student government and was a member of the math team and the National Honor Society.

“He was one of those kids you could talk all day about,” said Marshwood teacher and boys varsity basketball coach Mike Zamarchi.

“Everyone loved Troy,” said Mike Verrill, the father of Troy's good friend, Jack Verrill, and Troy's coach in rec basketball. “He had that smile and could make a situation lighter.”

Troy Pappas' unselfish approach to life meant he had no problem reaching out to others.

“One unique thing about Troy is I never heard him put any kid down or demean any kid,” said Marshwood athletic director Rich Buzzell. “He was always good to everybody. He was a kid who never made excuses for anything. He put a full effort into anything he did.”

He did it right.

For instance, Crosby recalled struggling with a class at school and asking Pappas to help him out. Pappas took time out of his week to tutor Crosby and help him improve his grade.

When Brady Dodge transferred from Noble last year, Zamarchi said Pappas was the first to talk to him and make him feel welcome as a member of the Marshwood basketball team.

“Some things he did went unnoticed,” Zamarchi said. “He did things behind the scenes and was a huge part of our success.”

Pappas was also a Special Olympics unified partner on his sister Rayna's basketball team, supporting his sister, a 2009 Marshwood grad, who has spent many years attending his games. He is also survived by his parents, John and Mary.

His work ethic was second to none.

“No one outhustled him or outworked him,” Zamarchi said. “He worked hard all the time.”

“You never caught him walking around,” Crosby recalled. “He was always hustling. He was real competitive. He worked hard to make other people around him better.”

“He went one speed,” said Eric Fernandes, the Marshwood baseball coach. “He never went around anything. He went through it.”

Marshwood assistant baseball coach Rick Chamblee said that when Pappas hit a ground ball to the pitcher, whereas others might give up on it, he ran it out hard and sometimes beat it out.

“That's how he played,” Chamblee said, “every moment of every game of every sport. If it wasn't 100 percent, it was 110 percent.”

Pappas was also the consummate teammate.

He did the dirty work in basketball, guarding the bigger players, diving for loose balls, setting picks, battling in the paint for rebounds. Doing the stuff that doesn't necessarily show up on the stat sheet.

In baseball he had no trouble playing where he was needed.

“He'd look at me and say, “Whatever's best for the team,'” coach Fernandes said. “Where others might not have done that, he did. ... He was very respected as an athlete and as a kid.”

Pappas was a hard person not to like.

“He was the guy everybody wanted to be,” said friend and former teammate Luke Fernandes. “There wasn't anything he didn't believe he couldn't do. Above all else, he's one of the best guys I've had the opportunity to know.”

Pretty funny guy, too.

Luke Fernandes remembers the time at the end of last basketball season, Crosby, Verrill, Pappas and he decided to don playoff beards with Just for Men. It met with mixed results.

Crosby and Verrill looked fine, but Pappas and Fernandes just had mustaches and, in Fernandes' words, “looked like fools. People made fun of us, but it was a brotherhood thing.”

There are Pappas sports moments in time that are suddenly crystal clear in recollection: His game-winning shot to beat Sanford during the 2011-12 basketball season; his 26-yard TD reception in the Lobster Bowl last summer; catching 21 consecutive innings behind the plate for his youth all-star baseball team in Cooperstown, N.Y.

Luke Fernandes mentioned a newspaper clipping still hanging in the Pappas house of their Eliot youth baseball all-star team after winning the district title. The picture is of 11-year-olds Luke and Troy kissing the trophy.

“It's a pretty funny picture,” Luke Fernandes said. “That was a good time.”

Luke Fernandes remembered being stuck at the baseball field in Rochester needing a ride to his truck on the other side of the city. He scrolled through his cell phone, shaking his head at name after name, until he came to Troy Pappas.

“Boom, he'll come to pick me up,” Luke Fernandes said. “Sure enough he pulls in later in his Cadillac with the music playing too loud, and I think one of the rims had fallen off. He was the accountable friend. He'd pick you up at midnight in a pinch.”

How unselfish was Troy Pappas? Even at 18 he thought of others, covering all his bases. His final wish was to be an organ donor.

“He had the right attitude and he cared,” Chamblee said.

Mike Whaley is the Sports Editor for Foster's Daily Democrat and the Rochester Times. He can be reached at mwhaley@fosters.com.